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Housing

The ordinances get the abuse backward. “It’s like saying if somebody gets burglarized they’re going to be kicked out of their house,” said Penny Venetis, executive vice president and legal director at the advocacy organization Legal Momentum. “If you’re the victim of a crime, how could you possibly be evicted from your house?”

It can have devastating consequences. “Women should not have to choose between being homeless and staying alive or keeping their children alive,” Venetis said. But “really that’s the choice you’re forcing them to make.”

What do Detroit, Cleveland and Milwaukee have in common? In this case, the answer has nothing to do with their geographic location or their size. Instead, it has to do with the fact that, in recent years, each has seen fit to enact nuisance ordinances with severely negative effects on domestic violence victims.

Many domestic violence victims report losing their housing due, at least in part, to the violence in their lives. Several jurisdictions have enacted laws specifically indicating that domestic violence victims are protected from housing discrimination.

Amici Curiae Brief of the American Civil Liberties Union, The National Consumer Law Center, and Legal Momentum, et al, in support of respondent on writ of certiorari to the U. S. Court of Appeal sfor the Fifth Circuit.

This brief focuses on two contemporary forms of housing discrimination that have had particularly devastating consequences: race discrimination in subprime mortgage lending and sex discrimination against victims of domestic and sexual violence.

Ms. Tucker is appealing the Circuit Court of Cook County ruling, affirming the Chicago Housing Authority's decision to terminate her Housing Choice Section 8 Voucher, without consideration of the applicability of the Violence Against Women Act and Ms. Tucker's status as a victim of domestic violence.